4.11.2010

My first time being aggregated! The Slow Love Life camellia post from a few weeks back is at The Daily Beast, which is exciting because they have large screen viewing at that theater. One morning recently friends started sending frantic calls and emails to turn on the radio, and there was the voice of Tina Brown being wonderfully generous about my new book, Slow Love. Naturally, I was in my pajamas, and I listened, spellbound. She talks about how she became a "cheese-aholic", going downstairs to her kitchen for big slabs of cheese all day, after she lost her magazine, Talk. "This extract certainly whetted my appetite for more of this kind of reflection on who we are when the music stops." Thank you, Tina Brown.

9 comments:

After leaving a very high profile job in Hollywood - I found myself taking a bath every day. I am not much of a bath person but I found it was the only place where I could truly escape and put my head back on straight. I started my own business and have never looked back.

After my third daughter left the nest for college last fall, I too felt a profane sense of a job lost. Nature is a huge solice. I have a small garden at a beach house,and watching seeds newly planted does give one a new sense of rebirth and creativity. Besides you don't have to dress up, and can even do it in your pajamas.

I saw and read (with considerable surprise and happiness, since I like it when Writers-I-Like stay in the business) that the "Daily Beast" had reprinted your original blog-post in expanded form. I told Herve (who's either my boyfriend or my husband, depending on whose jurisdiction we happen to be squatting in, at any particular moment) about it. He Said "GOOD!" (He's, actually, the one who gave me my first copy of "Around the House and In the Garden").

In any case, I think you're doing deservedly well. Like many other folks who've posted on this board of yours?.....I subscribed to H&G simply because this household enjoyed your writing and looked forward to it each month.

Here's a couple of quotations for you (Forgive me for being an ex-prepskool teacher who still retains the sentimental habit of handing out "helpful", if usually unsolicited, quotations to folks). I think that both will be of use to you...and I hope they'll remind you to simply keep on writing that good stuff you write.

1. "When people say that nothing happens in their lives I believe them. But you must understand that everything happens to an artist; time is always redeemed, nothing is lost, and wonder never cease." (Muriel Spark, from her novel "Loitering With Intent")

2. "And so, having entered the fullness of my years, from there by the grace of God I go on my way rejoicing." (the last line from The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini, circa 1578)

In any case, it's good to have seen your work on the Daily Beast this morning.

Oh...however pinhead-ish it might seem?....that quotation from Muriel Spark had a typo. The quotation should end with (and this matters) "...and wonders never cease."

that ("wonder" and "wonders") makes a great deal of difference.

I doubt that Spark intend to suggest (nor would I ever believe the assertion) that the difference between artists and "average" people is that artists can't ever quite figure anything out and always have more questions and always "wonder".

Dear lady, you can't keep a light under a barrel for too long... soon everyone will be dropping by! Honestly, once we had to wait a month between greedy gulps of your prose... now we get lovely sips a few times a week. How great is that?

An another empty nester here: rejoicing! Oh, how grateful I am for peace...of house, mind AND garden! I do feel greedy as well....I steal away and read MY Dominique Browning Blog! You shall not be squashed!

After losing my job as editor of a regional metro magazine that was a victim of the recession, I became a pajama girl. For months I drifted around the house and my tiny garden in my PJs until time to pick up my daughter from school. The funny thing is that I also cover social events for the local newspaper. So, with no one the wiser, in the evening I put on heels, pearls and a smile to attend benefits and galas. The next day, back to window gazing in my nightgown.It all worked out, but I learned a lot about myself during the pajama days.

Tina Brown's husband, Harold Evans, has written a wonderful biography that includes an account of how he coped with being done in by Rupert Murdoch. (And even more interesting is how he fell in love with Tina -:)

As an aside to Ms. Browning: You mentioned in a post that your nephews had startling blue eyes. It is something I have always noticed in your photos. Is it a family trait? If so, how many have been blessed with those beautiful blues?

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SLOW LOVE means engaging with the world in a considered, compassionate way, appreciating the miraculous beauty of everyday moments, and celebrating the interconnected nature of life. SLOW LOVE LIFE is a place to share ways to practice daily mindfulness in the midst of our busy, productive days.

You are welcome to share images from the site, but please give credit to Dominique Browning, slowlovelife.com. Thank you!